Word: wuhan
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Probably not even Mao himself knew just how bad the situation really was. What was clear was that more and more elements of the army were siding with the anti-Maoists in the provinces in a spreading disaffection directly traceable to the by-now-famed incident in Wuhan. There, three weeks ago, General Chen Tsai-tao, whose command includes the vital Yangtze River hub city, seized two top Mao emissaries sent from Peking to bring Chen to heel. Peking negotiated the pair's release; but despite frantic efforts since then, Mao has been unable to subdue the open rebellion...
...Maoists could hardly afford to leave Wuhan in the hands of their enemies. The fifth largest city in China, Wuhan (pop. 2,800,000) is really three cities-Hankow, Wuchang and Hanyang-and is the Chicago of China-the transportation hub of the vast country. Its great double-decked vehicular and railroad bridge is the only span across the 3,100-mile length of the Yangtze between Nanking near the coast and Chungking in the western mountains. It is also one of Communist China's key industrial centers, pouring a quarter of the country's steel and producing...
...Liberate Wuhan! Two weeks ago, Mao took direct action to try to bring Wuhan into line. He dispatched Hsieh Fu-chih, Deputy Premier and China's top cop, along with Wang Li, the party's propaganda chief, to see General Chen. The confrontation at Chen's military headquarters was hardly under way when the Million Heroes, arriving in hundreds of trucks and backed by Chen's soldiers, surrounded the building. In the ensuing confusion, Wang Li and Hsieh Fu-chih were seized by the mob and carried away. Back in Peking, wall posters blossomed overnight with...
DEATH! and LIBERATE WUHAN! Radio Peking broadcast an ultimatum ordering the rebels to surrender or be wiped out by the Chinese army. Amid this show of force, Premier Chou Enlai, Peking's most experienced mediator, quietly went to work behind the scenes to negotiate with General Chen for the release of the two prisoners. He succeeded, and last week the freed emissaries returned to Peking and a hero's welcome at the airport by Maoist officials including Chou and Mrs. Mao and tens of thou sands of cheering Pekingese...
Bombs or Bombast? Three days later, wall posters proclaimed that loyal army paratroopers had been dropped near Wuhan and that gunboats had moved up the Yangtze, readying an attack on the rebel city unless it surrenders. Peking recently forbade foreigners to read and report on wall posters, a ban that is scarcely enforceable. Chinese radio communications monitored in Tokyo indicated a spreading breakdown in transportation. Passenger service in the Yangtze between Shanghai and Wuhan has been discontinued, and China's only electrified rail line, connecting Shensi and Szechwan provinces, was reported out of order...